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Playing Poker K-q On The Flop – Hit It Or Fold It
September 28th, 2009
I consider K-Q the weakest of my "majority play hands." Some pros may consider A-6 suited the weakest, because one might make a straight with A-2 suited. Others may consider 2-2 the weakest. A good argument can be made for any of these hands being the weakest of the majority play hands. Be that as it may, K-Q gets my vote for the weakest hand of the lot. This is a hand you need to hit on the flop if you are going to continue playing it.
Of course, when the flop is 4-10-J, and you hold K-Q, then you have an open-ended straight draw. In this case, you need to play the hand all the way to the end, in the hope of hitting your straight. The trouble flops for K-Q are something like A-Q-2 or A-K-5. You have flopped second pair (the kings or queens) with top kicker, and this hand is just strong enough to get you into trouble. You can't beat any ace, but you can beat almost every other hand.
Of course, it's always nice to see K-Q-4 (top two pair) or 10-J-A (nut straight) when you have K-Q! (Andy Glazer just elbowed me in the side and told me that the first time he ever played no-limit in a live game, he had K-Q and the flop came K-Q-4. His opponent had been holding pocket fours, and you can probably envision the ensuing carnage. Notwithstanding Andy's traumatic introduction to no-limit, if you flop top two pair in limit poker, you should push pretty hard.)
When you do hit K-Q, it is important to protect your hand by jamming the flop. K-9-2 and K-J-4 are pretty strong flops when you have K-Q. Without going into any further examples, suffice to say that K-Q is the kind of hand that you fold if you miss the flop, but jam with if you hit the flop, period.
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Tags: Playing Poker A-x Suited – Strong Flop Slow Play Or Not
September 26th, 2009
Suppose that a jackal in the first position raises and you call with 0-0 in the third position (even in this early position, this is a pretty easy call against a jackal). Now the fifth position and both blinds call the raise as well. The flop comes down 0-0-0, and now the big blind bets out and the jackal raises. What do you do now? You have flopped the nut flush! The others can't beat you unless they flopped a set and the board gives them a pair, or unless they catch perfectly on both of the next two streets (you can't live in fear of runner-runner).
If you reraise and make it three bets to go on the flop, you might drive out the fifth-position player and both blinds, and that's not what you want. You're not going to drive out anyone who flopped a set (that is, anyone who has a reasonable chance to beat you); you're going to drive out only people who need a miracle to beat you. This is the time when you should just call the two bets and hope that everyone else calls as well. Or better yet, just call, hoping that everyone else calls, and hope that the big blind reraises it. This is a time to keep as many players in the pot as you can on the flop, because in the next two rounds of betting the limits are doubled.
If everyone checks to you on the flop, then you should bet out one bet rather than checking. After all, you have to give the other players a chance to check-raise you on the flop! You have to start building a pot sometime, and the flop is the place to make sure that you get at least one bet in the pot. Making the pot larger now may encourage people whose hands are still trailing badly to call for the size of the pot later (they may call bets later because they want to try to win the big pot out there), when they (although they won't know it) have little or no chance to win.
Trying to lure in the maximum number of bets in a hand is a nice problem to have, but doing it well every time can be tricky. Most of the time, in most pots, no one gets the maximum anyway when playing with a monster hand. After all, we can't see everyone else's hole cards. So just' strive to get as close to the maximum as you can.
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Tags: blinds, casino, fifth position, poker